Diabetes: A Deadly Problem

By Joel Fuhrman, M.D.

Diabetes is a serious disease, marked by higher than normal levels of glucose (sugar) in the blood. Diabetes affects about 135 million people worldwide, and the number of sufferers has been increasing steadily due in part to a rise in obesity.

Hundreds of millions of people have type 2 (adult onset) diabetes (more than 90 percent of diabetics have type 2). For example, over 2.5 million African-Americans have diabetes, and 25 percent of all African-American women over 55 have type 2 diabetes. The rates of Americans undergoing amputation and suffering from blindness and kidney failure from this disease also are skyrocketing. Diabetes significantly accelerates the build-up of plaque inside blood vessels (atherosclerosis), leading to heart attacks.

As the number of people developing type 2 diabetes as a result of obesity soars, more and more physicians are being called on to care for these patients. Well-meaning physicians prescribe drugs in an attempt to lower the dangerously high glucose levels, the high cholesterol and triglyceride levels, and the high blood pressure typically seen in diabetics, since elevated levels are strong predictors of damage and/or premature death.

Unfortunately, treating diabetes with medication gives patients a false sense of security because they mistakenly think their somewhat better controlled glucose levels are an indication of restored health. This false sense of security provides patients with implicit permission to continue the same disease-causing diet and lifestyle that led to the development of their diabetes. What patients (and many physicians) do not understand is their “controlled” diabetes continues to damage their organs and heart. Inevitably, the diabetes worsens, complications develop, and the patients die young. The tragedy is that all his suffering is unnecessary because adult onset diabetes can be effectively and relatively quickly reversed in over 90 percent of patients. The key to success is nutritional excellence and exercise.

Don’t treat your diabetes and don’t control it. Instead, make the commitment to get rid of it!